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I am not sure what to say about us, Nigerians. Should I praise the Nigerian spirit for resilience in the face of a misery index those from countries seen as the pits of hell want to get away from. Or should one castigate the people of the country for acting like zombies as their inchoate economy retrenches further, facilities collapse in such a manner that a Nigeria regional manager for south African Airways uses words that suggest our major airports are epidemics waiting to breakout. But if truth be told, what puzzles me the most about the Nigerian condition is the total loss of a sense of shame in people who hold positions of public authority in Nigeria. Their swagger in the face of south bound reality beggar’s belief.


A few years ago, I encountered the motto of a secondary school, I fell totally in love with. But now I am wondering if the last line should not be doctored a bit. The motto urges students to work hard and play hard for
“when wealth is lost, nothing is lost
When health is lost, something is lost
When character is lost, all is lost.”
But I feel that extant experience suggests that when a sense of shame is lost, all is lost. May be a fourth line should be when shame is lost nothing can be salvaged.
There is hunger and anger in the land. In some desperation and despair stands up in sharp relief. But you would not guess that when the excellencies cruise past in long motorcades that drain the public treasury. How did we get this way?

I have struggled to understand how societies fail, in human history. This is why I have found efforts of people like Jared Diamond to offer explanation, in Collapse, for example, quite intriguing. Given, the place of my birth, it should not be a surprise that my biggest challenge has been Nigerian’s failure to make progress and the bigger tragedy of the phenomenon I have come to identify as progressive degeneration where, safe a few examples, governments have been progressively worse, suggesting that learning is a problematic idea.

That grabs my attention as a teacher, especially one who has done some work on organizational learning and know that unless the rate of learning in an organization is equal to, or greater than the pace of change in the environment, Rewan’s axiom, the organization is dinosaur-status bound.


The logic suggests that with climbing the learning curve and getting a return on Experience, those that follow should do better than the ones who bore the costs of errors not foreseen. But not so in the Nigerian experience. Compare governance and governing in Nigeria before 1975, with today.


Imagine current reality. The economy is inchoate and reeling from largely self-inflicted error; the power sector is in disarray and manages to aggravate the misery index in ways difficult to describe to anyone who has never lived in Nigeria. The aviation sector is a pain merchant causing people hardships that make the fear of travel the beginning of wisdom. The roads as alternative means are not much to look to.

After a recent road journey from Benin to Abuja my body was clearly calling for medical help but I was afraid that to reach a doctor may result in iatrogenic intervention where the medicine could do more damage than the disease, evidently the case with policy and problems in the country. Elections have become wars and public office holders consume resources for infrastructure and growth, in the enjoyment of the perquisites of power.


All these may bring the normal to the brink of tears but they do not trouble me as much as the fact that those on whose watch a country is crumbling walk with such swagger you feel you have just left the requiem for a sense of shame. If shame has not been buried in Nigeria, all of us should be acutely worried that the state of things is the moral equivalence of war. Nations at war mobilize all available resources, define clear strategies. Few know which direction we are travelling and even many inside privately plead they are outsiders in government.


What is holding Nigeria back from doing what is right for the next generation to know progress? After much ponder, I am convinced the problem is culture; In particular, the culture of the dominant political actors in Nigerian history. Nigeria has suffered state capture since 1966 and the group of soldiers who ceased the Nigerian state that year, retain a firm grip 50 years after, even if crisis of legitimacy forced them from time to time to install fillers like the Shagari, Yaradua, Jonathan stop-gaps.


Culture matters. Long before the Harvard Colloquium on How Values Shape Human Progress I was certain that culture had great consequence for progress. While people like the Peruvian Economist Hernando De Soto down play culture in arguing that institutions are central to how man makes progress, my own Growth Drivers Framework, draws both, and a few other variables, into explaining why some countries are poor while their peers thrive.
So the question remains why did Nigeria stall when less favored Asian counterparts surged forward in the 1980s. The so called Resource Curse study at the World Bank in the mid-90s domiciled the problem with Oil, to an extent, if you extrapolate. Then Oil boomed again in the first decade of the twenty first century and Oil producing Arabs like Quater, UAE, and others developed dramatically.

Again, Nigeria stalled. In my view the class of 1966 cannot help itself. It was socialized into a view of triumph as the Hunt. The hunter mindset is kill and share, divide and rule. Nation builders on the other hand, as Farmers sow and water. They gather together those around so the pool of Labor will make harvest easy. The class of 1966 is a class of hunters so that even though part of their entitlement mindset is that they fought a Civil War to unite Nigeria, the reality is that the nature of their hunter orientation manifests in conduct that has done more to disunite Nigeria than enemies of Nigeria could do if they desired its break up. Because of their booty, war treasure, view of how they see government the class of 66 sees all who suggest a different way to make the country move forward as scavengers looking for a piece of this bush meat they have hunted down. They lack the worldview that there are people whose only motivation is to be proud of the Green passport they carry. So they seek to incorporate those who are disposed to bowing before them and despise the independent minded. They found clones who were Governors between 1999 and recently.

Those proved to be accelerators of the Nigeria collapse. Nothing better shows that than my fight with them around the need for savings. They squandered oil receipts with nothing to show. But they still swager today, many still in government.


The culture of the class of 66 drove us, first hesitantly, then with deliberate speed into the cusp of a failing state. But it will be unfair to lay our downfall at the feet of the class of 66 alone. Our failure to speak truth to power, produced a generation that looked away rather than call a spade a spade. We were reduced to a generation that Bob Garratt would describe as “maliciously obedient to patently stupid instructions” from power.


The class of 1966 itself fractures roughly into 3 groups I label the Modernizer Wannabes, the Narcissistic Influencers and The Entitlement Minded Praetorian Guard. In their intragroup competition they sometimes pour out voluble, vengeful and vain glorious, vituperative vilifications they unleash a vile, venomous, vexatious volume of vicious vendetta that numbs polity and poisons the investment climate. The effect on our political culture has been the gift of a cadre of political actors who care more for protocols, charter flights, presidential fleets, and motorcades than the fact those they govern people living in conditions of great misery. They betray a failure to understand that leadership is other-centered conduc as self love defines public choice.


I have never understood how people could sleep, chartering planes with taxpayers money, when many of the taxpayers cannot afford more primitive commutes to their place of subsistence eking out of a living. But if you understand the culture of the class of 1966 you will appreciate why it is a time of insensitivity to the plight of the rest of society. An army of occupation can rationalize things in amazing logic.
I reflected on these ideas for years but as the engaged citizen, I looked for and worked at ways we could mitigate these tendencies.

In 2015 the evidence came in fully. The class of 1966 is problematic beyond the “share the Gala, share the booze” mentality. The class of 1966 has crippled the dreams of two generations because entrenched in their culture is the absence of a sense of shame. I doubt that Nigeria will make progress until the eclipse of the class of 1966 is total.


Pat Utomi Political Economist and Professor of Entrepreneurship is founder of the Centre for Values in Leadership.


http://www.patitospost.com/when-a-sense-of-shame-is-lost-pat-utomi/

About Professor Patrick Utomi



Pat Utomi, a professor of political economy and management expert is a Nigerian entrepreneur whose ultimate goal is to positively affect humanity.

Born in Kaduna on February 6, 1956, Utomi hails from Ibussa in Delta State. He had his primary education at St Thomas School, Kano, 1960-62 and Our Lady of Fatima School, Gusau, 1962-1966. He later proceeded to the prestigious Christ the King College, Onitsha, for his post-primary education and finished up at Loyola College, Ibadan in 1971.

Utomi had his first degree in mass communications at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, UNN. He also holds MA, MPA, and Ph.D in political economy.
He was director of research and corporate affairs, News Training Consultancy, Lagos; chairman/chief executive officer, Patike Communications Limited. In 1982, he was appointed special assistant to President Shehu Shagari.

Following the demise of the Second Republic, he became chairman/chief executive officer, Utomapp Holdings Limited, 1984-86, and assistant general manager, corporate affairs, Volkswagen of Nigeria Limited, Lagos, 1983-93.
Utomi co-founded the Lagos Business School, now Pan African University in 1994 with the Opus Dei, a Catholic religious group. He was scholar-in-residence, American University, Washington DC, USA, 1996 and research associate, the Harvard Business School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA, 1996.

He also belongs to many professional bodies. He is a member, Nigerian Institute of Public Relations, NIPR, Institute of Directors, IOD, Nigerian Economic Summit Group and Nigerian Economic Society.
He coordinated the establishment of several civil society groups on good governance and accountability such as Transparency in Nigeria,The Centre for Values in Leadership, The Concerned Professionals, and the Restoration Group. In the business sphere, Utomi is the vice-chairman, Platinium–Habib Bank. He is an accomplished columnist, and chairman, BusinessDay Media Limited and creator of Patito’s Gang, a television talk show.

Utomi has published several books on political economy and management.

https://mobile.facebook.com/rochasOkorocha2019/?_rdc=1&_rdr
that's the link to like the page

With Buhari out of the 2019 race, Okorocha may have began his quest for the highest office come 2019.

Owelle had already stated that he won't contest against Buhari. Banking on his following in the core northern Nigeria he stands the strongest chance of winning.

With his kinsmen endorsement he has nothing standing in his way.


Both from the north and west ...comments show clear acceptance by all

Chief Rommy Ezeonwuka said Igbo people need to learn from the mistakes they made during Biafra

- The Ogirishi of Igboland said Igbos need to stop investing outside Igboland

- He said Ojukwu has already declared Biafra and there is no need to make another declaration

Chief Rommy Ezeonwuka has said that Igbos are making the same mistake they made at the end of the Biafra war by investing outside Igboland. Vanguard reports that the Ogirishi of Igboland said the agitation for Biafra was already declared by Chief Chukwuemeka Odumegwu and there was no need to make another declaration.

He reminded Igbos that most of them lost their properties at the end of the Biafra war and had to start afresh from the 20 pounds they received from the federal government. Ezeonwuka wondered why Igbos would still continue to invest outside Igboland and then be agitating for Biafra at the same time when they were likely to lose all the investment if the country broke-up.

He said: “If you call yourself an Igboman or a Biafran, you must have heard that only 20 pounds was released to every Igbo man shortly after the civil war, and their properties were forcefully taken away from them in some parts of the country in the name of abandoned properties, yet they managed to survive”.


“However, he continued, it is quite unfortunate that the same Ndigbo who suffered these deprivations have not learnt our lessons from it, to the extent that after surviving the post-civil war trauma, they still went ahead to invest all their monies outside Igbo land where their monies and properties could be abandoned for the second time in the event of another outbreak of war or possible break-up of the country”.


“I presume that Ndigbo cannot be identified as fools with their first mistakes but with this second mistakes of continuing to invest massively in other parts of the country, as they are doing now in their numbers, they can be identified as proper fools and as such, the step could be likened to an Igbo adage which states that first fool is not fool but second fool is proper foolishness”.


READ ALSO: Abuja Court asked to sack President Buhari and Osinbajo


“To me, Biafra republic has already been declared by Ojukwu in 1967 and there will be no need for declaration of Biafra for the second time. Ojukwu declared it, fought for it and died for it. There will be no need for a second declaration. All we need to do is to do remembrance anniversaries and befitting burials for those who died during the struggle”.


He also reacted to General Alani Akinrinade’s statement that he would not have participated in the war if he had known some of the issues affecting the country would be happening now. Ezeonwuka described it as “medicine after death or better still, crying over a spilled milk”.


Read more: https://www.naij.com/1105064-igbos-blame-themselves-nigeria-break-up.html

papaejima1:

Is your grouse with the Igbo or Arewa or South west?
You "rigmaroled" from Arewa statement to South west vote count and then singled out Igbo for castigation for "hiding like women"

Is Igbo a bone in your Urhobo throat?
Why don't you face how to make Urhobo a "strong and majority" tribe and leave Igbos alone?

It would take a hundred years of almajiri marriage and birth pattern for the urhobo nation to achieve that.


But you guys should exploit your majority status and change this country

On the heels of statements by the AREWA consultative forum that Kano gave more votes than the entire sw region



I went on a research ♒on the votes count and here are my findings


Ekiti. 120,331
Lagos. 792,460
Ogun. 308,290
Ondo. 299,889
Osun. 383,603
Oyo. 528,620


Total = 2,433,193 SW region




From Vanguard Buhari won by a 2.6 million margin


http://www.vanguardngr.com/2015/04/buhari-wins-by-2-57-million-votes-official-result/


it is safe to say that the South South and South East region look elsewhere for political partnership. They cannot be of help.

And the Igbo people should stop acting like minorities.....playing the weak card.

If the Urhobo nation had your numbers and spread we would dominate Nigeria. Not hiding like women......

in my next article I would proffer a better path to recognition for the igbo nation.


I have friends that are Igbos and I am only playing my part to keep Nigeria one



By
Ejiro-Oghene

Ermacc:
you are looking for intelligent response when you aren't sure of the intellect of your post.

okay

waiting

I seem not to understand the pattern of political play in Yoruba land. In all sincerity I am confused.


The support Buhari had in the south west was disturbing as we all knew his antecedent on Awolowo's death, recession and hardship during his first regime.......... However the south west overwhelmingly supported him.





Now they are shouting loudest for Buhari to resign from office and handover to Osinbajo that he is unfit to govern.

This was what we were saying ever since.


So here is the question?







Did the south west support for Buhari.... bringing the biggest recession, hardship and suicide among Nigerians......... Death of Middle belt Agatu and southern Kaduna under the despot............ slaughter of hundreds of shites.. men, women, children and unborn babies........ death of igbo protesters and the greatest hardship Nigerians have ever seen ........and the herdsmen deaths all over the country


......Just so that Osinbajo a Yoruba man can become President??








Please be truthful..... direct...... avoid cursing....... while answering the question.


The reason for the question is because we all knew Buhari's government was hell in the first regime ......

So if no is the answer to my question.... why did your region vote Buhari...... Jonathan can be excused as we never knew he would be corruption personified....... But we knew Buhari...... so what is rationale behind such voting pattern...




Time For The Truth

Against the run play..... Nairaland Version

it's Isoko north....... not Osoko

proudly Isoko (Oyede)

following

still following

urgent

please contact us

urgent please call

please nairaland





A friend of mine needs a single room in ikeja Maryland.


This could be a sublet room. He intended to stay for just 6 months.


please email him on

He is working and is willing to pay on Wednesday

today 9/5/2017

still waiting

please call

urgent please call

please nairaland





A friend of mine needs a single room in ikeja Maryland.


This could be a sublet room. He intended to stay for just 6 months.


please email him on
today 9/5/2017

As 2019 approaches, questions and intrigues are raised.
Would the North hold on to the presidency despite dragging the nation through the worst recession of the decade?
Would we continue to bear the brunt of hardship in the name of zoning and taking turns?


Here is a list of those for and against

Afenifere Leadership






Igbo, Yoruba can’t determine 2019 elections –ACF


The Arewa Consultative Forum has said that despite the current alliance of Ohanaeze, Afenifere and Ijaw leaders over emerging political issues ahead of the 2019 elections, none of the socio-cultural groups will determine who emerges the next President of the country.

Speaking with Sunday Telegraph, Chairman of the Forum and former Inspector-General of Police, Alhaji Ibrahim Coomassie, said much as there is nothing wrong or unusual about the current alliances and fence-mending among prominent groups, the election will be determined by the people.
“Wait till 2019 elections. I can tell you that these groups will not determine the direction of the elections in 2019. Rather, the only people who will determine it are the electorate. They are the people who will make the choice and go to the polls to cast their votes,’ he said.

The leaderships of Afenifere, Ohanaeze and the South-South including first Republic Information Minster, Chief E. K. Clark, have held series of meetings since the emergence of Dr. John Nwodo as President-General of Ohanaeze, in a move to enable the South to speak with one voice on topical political issues in the country. Before going into a closed door meeting Thursday, leaders of the South-South and South-East geo-political zones had called for restructuring of Nigeria to make all citizens of the country equal partners and partakers.

The New Telegraph, March 5, 2017

Its a barefaced fact that there is no difference in the pictures


Just two rogues with gullible supporters

Between the two pictures..... spot the difference
.

There has been a series of ,meeting led by Southern leaders. The latest meetings led by the leaders of the Ohaneze, Afenifere and Ijaw leadership has perfected plans to for the south to decide the future of Nigeria politically.

Read these links

Igbo and Yoruba Cannot Determine 2019 presidency

Excerpts
[url]
http://breaking.com.ng/nigeria/igbo-yoruba-cant-determine-2019-elections-acf/[/url]

The Arewa Consultative Forum has said that despite the current alliance of Ohanaeze, Afenifere and Ijaw leaders over emerging political issues ahead of the 2019 elections, none of the socio-cultural groups will determine who emerges the next President of the country.

Speaking with Sunday Telegraph, Chairman of the Forum and former Inspector-General of Police, Alhaji Ibrahim Coomassie, said much as there is nothing wrong or unusual about the current alliances and fence-mending among prominent groups, the election will be determined by the people.

“Wait till 2019 elections. I can tell you that these groups will not determine the direction of the elections in 2019. Rather, the only people who will determine it are the electorate. They are the people who will make the choice and go to the polls to cast their votes,’ he said.



Read also
http://abujareporters.com.ng/see-reactions-from-afenifere-ohaneze-as-ex-ig-coomassie-says-igbos-yorubas-will-not-determine-2019-elections/

The latest meetings were held in Lagos after a series of consultations led by Nwodo of the Ohaneze. Leaders of thought has harped on the rudderlesness of the North and the power vacuum created by Buhari's failure and ill-health and his inability to contest come 2019.

It is very glaring that there is no politician of Northern extraction that can inspire hope or reach across the southern-northern dichotomy. Atiku may have had some chance but perception on his part on corruption and deciet has tarnished his already disparaged image. This has been worsened by the attack of the Lagos Oba and his counter vituperation.

In all the stage is set for a weak Northern candidate to take on a rallying Ndigbo nation presidential aspirant. A show down is imminent as the entire south and a huge chunk of the middle belt are rallying with the idea of an Igbo president. The stage is set for an Igbo president come 2019 as the past presidents in the mold of IBB, Obasanjo and Abdulsalam Abubakar have thrown their support to the cause. The time is right and cause is ripe.



Read tomorrows article on other consolidating movements toward 2019.

Written by Ejiro

[url]
http://9ja.site/2017/04/06/2019-more-lights-shines-on-the-igbo-presidency/[/url]

modelmike7:
Loosers

I think the loser here is you and your country whose President has the fly out for mere treatment. ordinary surgery its India or UK

is Nigeria even a country?

If yes what can you boast of .....


#PARASITE

The street allegiance is strong.




Now is the time for fiscal federalism...before it is too late.

FeloniousFelon:
Tinubu smartness is due to yoruba gullibility

please not all yorubas are guilible. several of them refused to vote becos jonathan was underperforming. Many yorubas voted rightly .....pls differentiate

g

fastjett:
OREVA-OGHENNE EJIRO from your name its clear that you are not an Igbo man please dont pitch us against the Yorubas. You Niger Deltas has never supported us Igbos in anything in this country rather you lots keep betraying us. Now you have created this post hiding under the pretence as an igbo man. My Yorubas brothers please do not insult we igbos because of this post, in the face of any eventuality as regards the president health, the constitution will still favour the V.P

I WAS AT THE SEAPORT IN KOKO WARRI A FEW MONTHS AGO. CURRENTLY I AM TOURING CALABAR SEAPORT IN CROSS RIVER. I INTEND TO PRESENT A PAPER AT ABRAKA BY DECEMBER THIS YEAR.

I WONT SAY MUCH ON MY FINDINGS HOWEVER IT IS SAFE TO SAY THAT THE PORTS NOT FUNCTIONING IS DELIBERATE. TRAFFIC HAS BEEN DIVERTED TO LAGOS TIN CAN AND LEKKI DEEP SEAPORT. I WILL SUMMARISE MY FINDINGS SOON ON NAIRALAND.

HOWEVER AS A LITMUS TEST TRAVEL TO PORT AT CALABAR AND INQUIRE FROM PORT WORKERS WHAT IS WRONG. THEIR ANSWER IS THE SAME.........THE WEST.


THE CURRENT NPA HEAD FOR CROSS RIVER IS ALSO FRPM THE WEST. MY ANIMOSITY IS WELL FOUNDED.